Darth Credence
2022-01-17, 11:10 AM
My players are going to a festival! This is the midway point of the campaign, where it will be mostly political intrigue and setting the stage for things to come, but I want them to have something to do other than just participate in the various tournaments going on. They have arrived in the city early, so things will be setting up around them. The festival will have several touring carnivals there to interact with, and each one will have their own menagerie.
I think it will be fun for the characters to deal with a menagerie getting loose and running free through the city, but I'm not sure how I want to run it. They could easily just kill all of the animals - I don't want them to simply do that, so the animals will come from the carnival that they have friends in. I want them to need to round up the animals to be returned, protecting the people in the city while they are at it, and maybe needing to put down one or two that are particularly dangerous.
The party is all level 11 - 2 bards, one artificer, one blood hunter, one paladin, and maybe a wizard. (They have to take a few sessions off, so probably won't be back by then, and their character will still be sick in their room. Quick side rant, I told the other players the wizard's player couldn't make it for a month, so we would have them have a reason to not be there. The wizard got food poisoning and was staying in bed, and they started asking if cure wounds, or lesser restoration, or getting a cleric in, would work, until I finally said it's plot poisoning, and nothing can cure it until the player is back.) I'm going to spoiler list their relevant spells and equipment in case anyone wants to see it.
Paladin - standard stuff, create food and water might help.
Artificer - Disguise self, longstrider, vortex warp, web, haste.
Blood hunter - Earthbind, spider climb.
Bard 1 - Minor illusion, conjure woodland beings, dimension door.
Bard 2 - Mage hand, feather fall, tiny barn (like tiny hut for horses), sending
Wizard - so many spells, and who knows what they would have ready on any given day.
Paladin - decanter of endless water
Artificer - alchemy jug, pipes of haunting
BH - immovable rod (1 of 2 in party), bands of binding
Bard 1 - Nothing of note
Bard 2 - cursed ring of invisibility
Wizard - gem of brightness, potion of hill giant strength
How would you run this? I've only run one thing that could really be described as a "skill challenge", but I think that's the route I want to go. If anyone has suggestions or tips on how to run a skill challenge, I'd love to hear them. If anyone has ideas for what animals should be involved, that would be great, too. I specifically do not have dinos of any sort in the world. To replace the T-Rex as the strongest beast, I have a giant cat based on the giant cat from Attack of the Clones. Right now I basically have that the animals will escape (probably a rival carnival opens the cages and smokes them out, but I'm not wedded to that) and flee, ending up charging down the streets of the town near the harbor. The streets are very crowded, with a lot of people in town for the festival. Some animals will likely take the time to attack and eat, but most will just be running from whatever caused them to escape and flee.
I think it will be fun for the characters to deal with a menagerie getting loose and running free through the city, but I'm not sure how I want to run it. They could easily just kill all of the animals - I don't want them to simply do that, so the animals will come from the carnival that they have friends in. I want them to need to round up the animals to be returned, protecting the people in the city while they are at it, and maybe needing to put down one or two that are particularly dangerous.
The party is all level 11 - 2 bards, one artificer, one blood hunter, one paladin, and maybe a wizard. (They have to take a few sessions off, so probably won't be back by then, and their character will still be sick in their room. Quick side rant, I told the other players the wizard's player couldn't make it for a month, so we would have them have a reason to not be there. The wizard got food poisoning and was staying in bed, and they started asking if cure wounds, or lesser restoration, or getting a cleric in, would work, until I finally said it's plot poisoning, and nothing can cure it until the player is back.) I'm going to spoiler list their relevant spells and equipment in case anyone wants to see it.
Paladin - standard stuff, create food and water might help.
Artificer - Disguise self, longstrider, vortex warp, web, haste.
Blood hunter - Earthbind, spider climb.
Bard 1 - Minor illusion, conjure woodland beings, dimension door.
Bard 2 - Mage hand, feather fall, tiny barn (like tiny hut for horses), sending
Wizard - so many spells, and who knows what they would have ready on any given day.
Paladin - decanter of endless water
Artificer - alchemy jug, pipes of haunting
BH - immovable rod (1 of 2 in party), bands of binding
Bard 1 - Nothing of note
Bard 2 - cursed ring of invisibility
Wizard - gem of brightness, potion of hill giant strength
How would you run this? I've only run one thing that could really be described as a "skill challenge", but I think that's the route I want to go. If anyone has suggestions or tips on how to run a skill challenge, I'd love to hear them. If anyone has ideas for what animals should be involved, that would be great, too. I specifically do not have dinos of any sort in the world. To replace the T-Rex as the strongest beast, I have a giant cat based on the giant cat from Attack of the Clones. Right now I basically have that the animals will escape (probably a rival carnival opens the cages and smokes them out, but I'm not wedded to that) and flee, ending up charging down the streets of the town near the harbor. The streets are very crowded, with a lot of people in town for the festival. Some animals will likely take the time to attack and eat, but most will just be running from whatever caused them to escape and flee.